Education Is Not Only About Knowledge Transfer But Ways Of Individual Development

The process of learning through doing is experiential learning. It is widely known that students are better able to connect ideas and knowledge taught in the classroom to real-world issues when they are engaged in hands-on experiences and reflection.

The principal of Sri Sairam Engineering College, Chennai, Prof Porkumaran Karantharaj, emphasised experiential learning and said that it is very important. He further said that instead of thinking about 'what to learn and what to teach', the focus should be on 'how to learn and 'how to teach'.

“Skilling and reskilling are very important in connections with strong industry alliances and partnerships. That’s why, most institutions have updated their curricula according to the industry demands and expectations,” Karantharaj added.

Whereas, Dr AT Ravichandran, Dean & Professor - Department of Mechanical Engineering, Vel Tech Rangarajan Dr Sagunthala R&D Institute of Science and Technology, focusses on how learning attitudes have changed after the pandemic when we started providing digital devices to our little children.

Ravichandran counts the new challenges and said, “It is now on faculty members, how they will attract students’ attention and change the mindset that will lead to more involvement of students in what we are teaching, which is possible only by bringing experiential learning in practice and iDEX by the government of India is one of the best examples.”

Adding to that, Prof Sridar Natarajan, Dean, Chennai Business School, said that there should be experiential learning, which will excite the students about learning.  

“We are more focused on exams and marks now rather than the overall development of students that will be ready to contribute to the industry,” Natarajan said.

The academicians and industry experts were engaging into a discussion at 6th BW Education Annual Higher Education Conference, held at Chennai on Wednesday.